


What doesn't kill you makes you stronger - or how to survive the All Star Weekend.

by Columbarius13



Series: The sweetness of laughter [3]
Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Carey Price is a Troll, Humor, NHL All-Star Weekend, Other, Ovie is the Flashheart of the Hockey Fandom, Prank Wars, Sheep, Trolling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-29
Updated: 2015-12-29
Packaged: 2018-05-10 05:17:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5572393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Columbarius13/pseuds/Columbarius13
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Flower has to repay Ovie for his assistance in Boston and tries to do so in his own, inimitable, style. Of course, Ovie doesn't want Flower to have the final word either.  And it's the All Star Weekend, and hockey players are nosey, bored, and gossipy with easy access to alcohol (thanks Luongo!) so things kind of snowball from there. </p><p>(Although part of a series, this also can be read as a stand alone).</p>
            </blockquote>





	What doesn't kill you makes you stronger - or how to survive the All Star Weekend.

**Author's Note:**

> Please note, conversations in italics are in French. 
> 
> No sheep were harmed in the making of this story, but please do not try this at home with a sheep. You won't have Carey Price to bail you out. 
> 
> Extensive watching of the All Star events went on to create this story. Events are therefore generally fairly reliably portrayed, which also means there is an incidental mention of Patrick Kane in there, since he was a thing at the weekend. If anyone ever has any questions about anything that weekend - I now feel like I am the world expert in the useless minutiae of that weekend. The joy I felt when something happened in real life that was ever so useful for the story (like Flower going to join Ovie's table backstage at the draft when Seguin was drafted - actually was a thing!). 
> 
> Thanks to holesinthesky for some epic beta-ing! 
> 
> More notes at the end :)

Flower walks grumpily into his room, dumping his bags, which have magically become heavier and more awkward the longer he’s been carrying them. Yeah, it’s the All Star weekend and he is actually looking forward to it and trying not to think about what he could have been doing instead, determinedly not thinking about sandy beaches and warm oceans. He’s absolutely sure Columbus is a lovely place to come to for a weekend in January, but he still had to travel to get here and regardless how much they get pampered, it’s still travelling and after a while, it all sucks. 

He glances around the room, familiarising himself with the layout, but his gaze is halted by something lying on the desk, out of place. He wanders over, picks it up. It’s a room key, like his own, but with “HOUSEKEEPING” emblazoned on it in Sharpie. Underneath it is a paper list - he looks in more detail - yes it’s room assignments for the next 24 hours. 

Suddenly his grumpiness is gone and he’s grinning from ear to ear. He’s got a housekeeping skeleton key, forty other hockey players in the same hotel and a list of where his victims’ rooms are. Could anything be better than this? 

He sits down to study the list, like he’s looking over a chocolate box description card trying to pick the most delectable. He thinks about what he can do, considers his options. 

Toews and Kane are in adjacent rooms. He pictures Toews getting red-faced and angry and laughs. Definite possibilities there. Especially when Toews is going to be all captainly at them. Giroux is a couple of floors up and Flower really wants to mess with his head so much… Luongo is on his floor, down the hall and Flower is sure he could drive him batshit mental since he’s halfway there already. And then his breath catches.. Ovechkin… Oh, Ovechkin is here. 

Flower knows, objectively, that he should be grateful for Ovechkin’s assistance in Boston. He is grateful for Ovechkin’s assistance in Boston. He knows that Ovie knows he is grateful to him - he had to thank him at the time. But that doesn’t mean he has to enjoy being grateful to him and Flower now has the opportunity for a revenge he hadn’t even realised he wanted, but now knows he wants so much. Besides there is French-Canadian honour to uphold. 

He changes and showers while planning. There’s not much to do later, so he pulls a pair of jeans and a hoodie on. The housekeeping list says Ovie will be checking in later that afternoon, but to be sure he quickly calls his room; no answer. Now, to find some willing assistants. He glances down the list, working out who he knows, who might help. 

The first one is easy. He has the room opposite Ovie so could be a key part of the plan, he’s French-Canadian and Flower has known him for years. He quickly calls him. 

“ _Hello Patrice, how are you? Have you arrived yet?_

It’s not just the Russians who have a network, and Flower is determined to make the French-Canadian network work for him this afternoon. 

“ _Marc-Andre! I’m here, got in an hour ago. I’m good thanks, how are you? Want to go get a beer and a gossip?_

Flower smiles. They might only see each other a few times a year - and not always in the best of circumstances - but Patrice Bergeron is undisputedly one of the nicest guys in the league and Flower has counted him a friend for years. 

“ _That would be great Patrice, but I wonder if I could come around to your room first?_ ” He pauses, knowing he’s about to commit, tries to sound trustworthy. “ _I need your help with a project_.”

Patrice half laughs, half groans. “ _Ohhhh Flower. And so it begins. I remember you in Vancouver. What are you plotting now? But sure, come around and tell me about it, I’m in room 512. I’m not agreeing to anything yet though._ ”

“ _Yeah, I’ll be right there. And really, I’m not sure what what you mean_.” He hangs up before Patrice can say anything else about his reputation. 

Patrice greets him with a grin and a hug. “ _So what are you up to now Flower?_ ”

Well, time for the fast talking to commence. Flower explains about the skeleton key. Patrice groans and shakes his head in despair that anyone could allow Flower to get their hands on such a thing. Flower explains his plan for Ovie’s room - Patrice laughs out loud and Flower thinks he has him. Patrice looks at him intently. 

_”But why Ovie in particular? I would have thought Giroux…_ ”

Flower exhales. _”There is a debt to be repaid_ ,” he says simply. _”It’s a matter of French-Canadian honour. We can’t let a Russian, and particularly not that Russian, beat us_.” Patrice groans, his head in his hands. 

_”Flower, Flower, Flower. What have you and him been up to?_ ” He holds up his hand quickly, shaking his head. _”That was rhetorical, I really don’t want to know. But yes, I’ll help, although something tells me I shouldn’t. But, the ring-side seat to his reaction will be good,_ ” and his jerks his head across the hall. _”You’ll need more than me, though. Four of us minimum? And where do we put the stuff_?”

Flower grins. “ _It’ll be great my friend, he’s going to go ballistic! Room 510 is empty tonight, so we can store the stuff in there. As for others, I'm sure we can persuade Roberto. And I thought of asking Seabs? He was always up for something, even as a junior_.”

Patrice nods. “ _And if we get Seabs, we get Keith. Kind of the more the merrier, my back needs protection! I can ask Segs as well, he texted earlier to say he had arrived and I don’t see him saying no. We’ll just have to make him promise not to tweet it_.” With that, they split up to pursue their victims. 

Seabrook, and by extension Keith, are relatively easy to convince. Roberto falls for the appeal to his loyalty to the French-Canadian brotherhood and the chance to mess with Ovie as well. Goalies are not the biggest fan of a guy who scores so often against them. When they return to Patrice’s room, Segs is standing grinning, leaning lazily against the wall. He looks delighted to be part of it. 

“Patrice said you couldn’t tweet it?” Flower feels so old next to him. Suddenly feels responsible. Which is an odd feeling, considering he has put together a crack team of NHL pranksters to ransack Ovie’s room. 

“Yeah, sure. Wish I could though!”

Luongo is standing behind him shaking his head and rolling his eyes. Time for Flower to take control and get this thing going. 

“Patrice, go call Ovie’s room again and then the one next door, just to make sure.” He watches Patrice dial, and then dial again, but there’s no answer at either room. 

“Ok, let’s go.” Flower snaps his fingers, pointing towards the door. 

And with that, they start removing everything they possibly can from Ovie’s room, and transferring it into the empty room next to Bergeron’s. Actually, there isn’t too much furniture, and the gym time does pay off because it gets moved relatively quickly - Flower’s past experience in doing this to rookies is a big asset here. Despite that, it still doesn’t go quickly enough. Flower is supervising Keith and Seabrook getting the bed out and turned around in the corridor to get into the next room when a voice come from behind him. 

“What the fuck are you all doing?”

There’s a thud as Duncs drops the end of the bed he’s holding. Flower spins around to see Toews glaring at them. Corey Crawford is with him, looking bemused, but laughing. 

“Room redecoration!” Flower says airly. “We didn’t like the decor.” He waves his hand in the general direction of the room they are removing the furniture from. 

Duncs is white-faced and looking at the floor. Seabs is red-faced and staring at the ceiling. Luongo and Segs choose that moment to come out of the storage room, arguing about the best way to place the tv. They couldn’t be caught more red-handed if they tried. Luongo grins as he sees the tableau in the corridor. 

“Hey Jonny, Crow. Come to help?” Nothing could sound more innocent than Luongo’s question, but Flower knows he’s enjoying this hugely. There’s not a hope in hell Toews will join in. Toews glares at him. 

“Why the fuck would you think I’d do a thing like that?” Toews bites off each of his words. He seems most pissed that those are two of his guys rolling furniture across the hall. Flower hadn’t imagined they would have had to ask permission of their captain before getting involved. 

Luongo has an immediate answer, not at all phased by the waves of fury radiating from Toews. “Canadian brotherhood of course! Team-bonding. Why do you think we’re all here? Our Canadian teammate sought our help and we rushed to oblige. It’s the All Star weekend, and team loyalties are forgotten.” He pauses, shrugs and grins more. “Besides, it will piss off Ovie hugely.” 

And that’s how they convince, against all the odds, Jonathan Toews to help as well. Flower would not have thought an appeal to his patriotism would work so well, given his strict Canadian need to follow any and all rules, but obviously Luongo has Tazer’s number. Flower wonders if he will share any goal-tending tips about him. Also, Flower isn’t actually aware of any rules anywhere which says ‘Thou shalt not remove all the furniture from a hockey player’s hotel room before he arrives and hide it in an empty room nearby’. Just as well really. Toews does keep reminding them to lift things with their knees and watch their backs, but since there are only a few more things to go, it’s not too annoying. 

“Someone needs to go to the lobby and watch for Ovie checking in… warn us and then get up here ahead of him if you don’t want to miss the fun.” Flower looks around them all. Crow looks at Toews. 

“We can do that - there’s a bar we can get a drink in with a view over the lobby,” he volunteers. Toews looks pained. “Oh come on Tazer, you don’t want to miss out on his reaction, otherwise there’s no point to us doing this.” Toews resignedly nods and follows him. The rest of them scrounge bottles from their own room and reassemble in Patrice’s room to await the arrival - Flower has to raid his minibar, but Duncs and Seabs come back with a six pack of beer, and Luongo has a bottle of vodka. 

“I have done the All Star game a lot,” he says to Flower’s raised eyebrow. “Trust me, it goes better with alcohol. Lots of alcohol.” 

It doesn’t seem that long a wait before someone is banging frantically on the room door and Crow practically falls into the room as the door opens, laughing, pulling a still unhappy looking Tazer behind him. 

“Oh fuck, that was close,” Crow gasps. “We had to get Carey to waylay him, or he’d have been in the same elevator as us! Poor Carey; he didn’t know what was going on, but when we last saw him he was asking Ovie if they had rodeo in Russia.” He’s trying to stop his laughter now. Flower wonders if at some point, every single player in the All Star game will be in on this. It’s certainly expanded way more than he’d have thought. Still worth it though. 

By mutual, pretty much unspoken accord, they congregate in the hallway of Patrice’s room, door slightly ajar, trying to remain as silent as possible to listen in on any reaction. They are rewarded by the sound of someone with bags making their way along the corridor. Flower peeps through the spyhole he has commandeered as the instigator of this, sees a stocky figure fiddling with the room key. He can’t stop the grin breaking out across his face as Ovie moves into the room, bags catching on the door, trapping it open. 

They all hear a growl of emphatic Russian as Ovie encounters a perfectly empty bedroom, the only thing left in place - helpfully - the room telephone. No bed, no tables, no lights. Toews even insisted on removing the curtains, saying that if you are going to do a thing, you must do it properly. They’d regretfully given the carpets a miss though. 

The voice from the bedroom is muffled, but still just about audible, if Flower times his breathing correctly. He’s obviously making use of the handily placed telephone. 

“My room is empty!’

“No, I mean it’s completely empty. Like a big empty room.”

“There is nothing here! There’s nothing in the room.”

“Look I know I fucking just checked in, so I have an empty room, that I’m the only occupant of the room today, but it’s really fucking empty! What the fuck is going on?”

“Listen to me! LISTEN!!!”

They’re trying so hard not to laugh out loud, but Flower can hear the stifled laughs getting louder as they hear an epically outraged Ovie getting louder and louder trying to explain to reception what is wrong. 

“THERE IS NOTHING IN THE FUCKING ROOM. NO FUCKING BED, NO FUCKING TV, NO FUCKING LIGHTS, NO FUCKING TABLES, NOT EVEN ANY FUCKING CURTAINS!”

“NO I HAVE NOT BEEN FUCKING DRINKING AND YES I AM IN THE CORRECT ROOM. YOU TOLD ME 511 ON CHECK-IN YES? I AM IN 5-FUCKING-11.”

At that Segs gasps aloud, eyes bright with tears of laughter. Flower is biting his hand, trying to restrain his laughter at the reaction. He can’t look at anyone else, knows that down route lies disaster. His sides hurt from trying to hold back. He can feel Luongo next to him shaking with the effort of trying to control his laughter. 

“I AM NOT TAKING ANY FUCKING TONE WITH YOU, I AM TRYING TO TELL YOU THERE IS NO FUCKING FURNITURE IN MY ROOM. I KNOW IT DOESN’T JUST DISAPPEAR, BUT THERE IS NOTHING HERE NOW.”

“I’M COMING BACK DOWN THERE NOW, AND I WANT TO SEE THE MANAGER IMMEDIATELY, HE WILL COME BACK WITH ME HERE TO SEE MY COMPLETELY EMPTY ‘THERE IS NO FURNITURE IN THIS ROOM’ ROOM.”

There is the sound of the phone being slammed down and when Flower checks Ovie is wrestling his bags fully into the room before slamming the door shut behind him as he exits back towards the lifts. There is a moment of utter silence from the group, the calm before the storm, as Flower gently closes the door as quietly as he can. 

And then there is an absolute hurricane of laughter. There’s a sprawl of bodies across the hallway as several of the NHL’s top players give into laughter, able finally to let their reactions out. 

“Ohmygod, the front desk misunderstanding….” Crow is red-faced and shaking, head in his hands. 

“No - no - no… when he told them he wasn’t taking any fucking tone with them….” Duncs has tears streaming down his face. 

Flower is choking “‘NOT EVEN ANY FUCKING CURTAINS ‘- Tazer man good call on removing them too,” he gasps. Segs is just lying alongside Bergeron on the floor, laughing too much to move, just crying as he laughs. 

Flower opens the door, checks the corridor, moves across to Ovie’s room. 

“Flower, where are you going?” asks Bergeron. 

“To get his bags too… .he’s left them unattended.” Flashing a wicked grin back to the group who are watching him now with undisguised awe, he quickly enters Ovie’s room, picks up his bags and transfers them into the room already holding the missing furniture. 

“Perfect.” He’s feeling so smug as he re-enters Patrice’s room, pulling the door closed behind him. There’s a round of applause as he re-enters the room and a buzz of excitement and chat as they wait to see what happens next. 

“Open the door again Flower, we want to hear what happens next,” says Tazer. Even he has broken down and is laughing, arms wrapped around his own waist like he’s trying to give the muscles extra support. The expression on his face is light and gleeful; Flower thinks it looks so odd on him. Flower nods at him anyway. 

“Shhhhhh,” he admonishes warningly, pulling the door open again slightly. Slowly they stop laughing although it takes a while before they stop setting each other off.

This time, it does seem to take an age before they hear the sound of people in the corridor. 

“I assure you Mr Ovechkin, your room was checked by housekeeping this morning and everything was in order then. I cannot imagine why you should say your room has no furniture!” The accent is American, and trying to be smooth and conciliatory. 

“I am saying it because it has no furniture. I don’t make this up. It has nothing.” At least Ovie has stopped shouting, but his voice is clipped, pissed off. Flower doesn’t blame him; the hotel staff seem very unwilling to believe that an entire roomful of furniture could vanish in a few hours. Have they never had hockey teams in the hotel before?

“Now, do you have your key? Let me see what is going on here… Oh, there is no furniture” the manager’s voice changes from cajoling and understanding, gaining in pitch as the barren room is revealed to him. “Where has the furniture gone?” His voice sounds wild now. There’s a fresh, hastily controlled splutter from the group.

“Why the fuck are you asking me? That is what I have been asking you since I came into my room! Why are you asking me, it’s obviously not in my bags?” The injured anger in Ovie’s voice is almost too much for Flower and he slaps his hand across his mouth to stop any sound escaping. Yes, this. “WHERE THE FUCK ARE MY BAGS?! I LEFT THEM HERE BEFORE I CAME DOWN. WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON IN THIS HOTEL?”

The manager seems to be very flustered now, watching Ovie go red and apoplectic in the corridor. “Well obviously I can only apologise for the inconvenience… we need to get this sorted… We need to find your furniture and your bags.” He pauses. “Let me just go and see if any of the other nearby rooms have seen anything happening.” Hilarity suddenly turns into panic in the group. Flower quickly closes the door over, holding the handle until the last moment to stop the tell-tale click.

Goalie reflexes let Luongo organise a plan first.“Quickly, move away from the door and try to look like we are just here to catch up,” he hisses. “Grab your drinks, spread out…”

Somehow they manage, on-ice speed and reflexes being used into good effect as they scatter across Patrice’s bedroom, trying to look like they weren’t all piled around the door thirty seconds earlier. There is a knock at the door, which Patrice moves to answer.. 

“Patrice - take your time, no rush!” whispers Flower urgently, picking up his vodka from where he left it, settling on the floor and stretching his legs out so he has a view almost to the door, but not where he can be seen from the corridor. 

“I’m sorry to bother you sir, I wonder if I can come in for a moment? It appears we’ve misplaced a few things from Mr Ovechkin’s room…. Did you hear or see anything being moved this afternoon when you arrived?” the manager is pushing into Patrice’s room, like he expects to find it crammed with the misplaced items, Ovechkin following behind still looking furious. Seabs is hiding his face in his hands at the manager’s question, shoulders shaking. Duncs punches him urgently just before the manager appears around the corner.

The manager seems relieved that everything is in order here, the furniture behaving itself, all present and correct. 

“No, nothing,” says Patrice evenly. “Alex, is there a problem? We haven’t been paying a lot of attention though, just catching up.” Flower has to admit he sounds pretty convincing. 

Ovechkin stops abruptly when he sees the gathering in the room, his face stilling. “It appears my furniture and my bags have gone missing from my room,” he mutters. Segs - it would have to be Segs - audibly swallows a giggle, turning it into a cough. Ovechkin frowns at him, head cocked to one side, eyes taking in the group in the room. They stop on Flower. 

“Ovie!” says Flower, grinning and waving his vodka at him. “That seems very careless of you. Do you think it all escaped when it found out who would be staying there?” 

The look Ovie gives him is disconcerting, all eyebrows and bright, intense eyes, like he’s being evaluated. 

“Flower! How can you say such a thing - if the furniture knew, all the furniture on the floor would have been trying to get into my room…” He walks over to Flower, snatches the vodka glass out of Flower’s hand and downs it in one, grinning at Flower’s surprised face. “That’s not great vodka my friend, a part Russian should be drinking better. I’m sad Geno hasn’t told you this. Or maybe he tried but French-Canadians think they know best?” He turns to look at the manager. “Really, enough - can I now be shown to a room with furniture? Finding it is not my responsibility. Although I’m sure these guys could help find the bags, if only they put to their minds to it.” He waves his hand around the room. There’s a choked laugh in response from someone in the room. 

The manager mutters an apology to Patrice and picks up the room phone, mutters into it briefly, asking reception to check what other rooms on the floor are unassigned. He listens for a moment then hangs up. 

“Mr Ovechkin, room 510 is also free. I’ll take you there just now and have someone bring you up a new room key at once. I can only apologise for the inconvenience.” He’s ushering Ovie from the room. Flower tips his head back against the wall, eyes shut, trying to imagine their faces when they find the missing furniture and bags next door in Ovie’s new room. He opens his eyes again, to find Patrice looking at him. 

“Flower, what have you done to deserve all the luck on this?” Patrice is grinning at him, as they wait to hear anything from the room next door. They don’t wait long. There’s a sudden banging on the shared wall between the two rooms. 

“YOU FUCKERS. I KNOW THIS WAS YOU AND I WON’T FORGET!” 

Flower raises his voice, “I GUESS YOU WERE RIGHT ABOUT ALL THE FURNITURE GOING TO YOUR ROOM OVIE!”

And that’s it - they’re finished and done and laughing so much now, not caring who hears them. 

It takes some time for them to stop laughing. But eventually, they do. 

“By the way,” Toews looks at Flower, “You aren’t keeping that skeleton room key. It would be like leaving a three year old with a box of matches.”

Flower does his best to look wounded, innocent and responsible. 

Segs bursts out laughing. Flower sighs. He didn’t think he could pull off the look, but he had to try. 

“I’m not going to do anything else with the room key. Well, certainly not against you guys. Canadians for ever and all that.” He’s giving it his all, trying to be convincing. 

Seabs frowns at him. “That’s not how it was in Vancouver…” Flower winces. He’d hoped they’d forgotten that. He eyes the pathway to the door, wondering if he can get out before anyone realises what he is doing. He stands up nonchalantly. Luongo, just as nonchalantly, is standing in the entrance to the hall, blocking it. Fucking weird goalie senses. He can start to see why non-goalies find it so annoying. 

“You’re not keeping it Flower.” Luongo is shaking his head at him. “I like to know I’m safe in my own hotel room and that won’t happen if I know you had the key.” 

“C’mon guys, what have I done to make you distrust me so much?” Flower asks, dismayed.

Keith snorts. “Vancouver.” And every other fucker who was at the Games nods or grunts in agreement. Even Seguin is nodding, and he wasn’t even there. 

“Ok, fine. I’ll give it to Patrice. We all trust him right? He can hold it until the end of the weekend, then you know I won’t use it against you. Not that I would!”

There’s a short pause while this offer if considered, then Toews speaks again. “Yeah, that’s fine. Patrice are you happy with that?”

“I’m honoured at the trust you’re all showing in me!” Flower glares at him, but hands the skeleton key over with a deep sigh. “Now, gentlemen, my bedroom is a bit cluttered with hockey players and I really want to shower - anyone want to reconvene in the bar in an hour?” 

0--0--0

There’s a press/publicity thing the next day which Flower is required to attend in the morning. His hangover isn’t too bad, and easily dealt with by a tonne of water and some breakfast. Everything’s good natured with the press and the fans, and he has to admit he enjoys it more than he thought. 

He goes back to his room to change into something a bit more casual and less branded, and thinks about how to spend a riveting afternoon in Columbus before the All Star Draft that evening. As he enters his room he is is debating going down to the rink. It’s not like he’s never…. 

His thoughts trip over themselves and come to a complete halt. He didn’t think you could be speechless without an audience present, but apparently you can. 

Everywhere - EVERYWHERE - in his room is covered in flowers. It’s like a florist shop has vomited all over his room. Not just one or two vases. He can see them crammed together on every surface, dozens and dozens of bouquets and vases, all different kinds of flower, colours, shapes and types. Carnations battle for space with tulips, chrysanthemums snuggling into sunflowers. It looks like there’s a spray of bird of paradise flowers on his pillow. There are even some white and blue flowering plants on the floor, in pots, next to the window. The smell is overpowering - heady, rich and fragrant. A sudden premonition leads him to open the bathroom door. His bath is filled with dahlias. His sink is filled with lily of the valley and lilies. The vanity is covered with mixed bouquets. They’ve even put the toilet seat down, and there are three vases balanced precariously on the toilet seat, surrounding a spiky, upright cactus - he shakes his head at it. So, so wrong. 

On the cistern there are peach roses combined with some kind of green thing. There’s a bright red amaryllis plant in his walk-in shower, surrounded by what looks like bunches of lilacs. 

It seems like every flower in Columbus has taken up residence in his room - he shakes his head in disbelief. And sneezes. 

Going further into the room, he finds a card tucked away between a vase of pink and yellow roses and one of white freesias and blue irises on the desk. He opens it. 

“Seems all the flowers came to see you Flower!”

“Tabernak.” he mutters. He does find himself laughing at the ridiculousness of it all though - trust Ovechkin to get his own back with a truly over the top gesture. A glimmer of an idea hits him and he quickly pulls his phone out to take several pictures of the scene. He texts his team with the comment _Looks like I have an admirer in Columbus! ))))))_

Two minutes later he has the response he was hoping for and it’s from Tanger.  
_))))))) Mind if I tweet it?_

_No go ahead_

_that was too easy what are you upto?_ comes the response

That wounds Flower, it truly does. Why is everyone so suspicious of him? But he also has to admit that Tanger does know him very well. 

He responds with, _Payback for the sender_

_?????_

_Ovie_

_FUCK! Is there something i should know????!!!!!!!_ Flower can imagine Tanger chortling as he composes this text. 

_no asshole Im a happily married man! But also entirely irresistible obviously_

_Oh Flower what did you do???!!!!! Tweeting now!_

As he waits, he glances at the other texts he gets; lots of laughing at him and chirps, and he knew he’d get those. Sid has suggested getting in touch with the Pens media team though.

 **Can’t imagine you’d want to keep them so donating them would be a nice touch?! They can probably sort it out for you…**

Hmm. That’s really a good idea actually. Shame to let the flowers go to waste and if he can use them to brighten someone else’s day, then so much the better. He grins. Who knew Ovie was so philanthropic? 

He checks Twitter - he may not officially be on it, but it doesn’t mean he isn’t on it at all - and Tanger’s tweet of his photo is out there accompanied with the caption “Can we find Flower in the flowers? Someone obviously likes him A LOT!!! #madness #secretadmirer #NHLAllStar”. 

The Pens PR team have obviously seen the tweet already when he calls them next. 

“Flower what are you up to?” Jen sounds suspicious.

What, no “hello Flower, how are you doing representing the Penguins organisation in the dullest place on the planet?” as a greeting? He sighs, he really does. He’s trying to be nice here, and they’re accusing him of being up to something? How does he get such a reputation. 

“Nothing of course, I’m always a victim!” There’s the sound of quickly muffled laughter at the other end of the phone. 

“Sure, Flower.” Ah well, it was worth a try. He quickly explains what help he’s looking for. 

“That’s actually a good idea, particularly after Kris’ tweet. We can probably get Jackets or NHL PR to help since they’re actually on the spot and it makes everyone look good. Leave it with us, we’ll make some calls and get back to you. Thanks for this!” There’s a pause and he’s about to hang up when she coughs “Emm, there’s nothing else you feel you should tell us is there?”

“No, should there be?” He’s a bit pointed about it. What a question to ask!

“Oh no, nothing like that!” her tone is too bright, too reassuring, too obviously lying. “I mean, you’re a respected member of the Penguins and we know you’ll do a great job representing us - as this shows. But we really don’t want another Vancouver, you know?”

He almost growls down the phone at her before hanging up. 

He wanders around for a bit admiring the flowers, but even their sheer presence is like an itch. Ovechkin responded, which means he’s had the last word. And in the scheme of things, Flower should be able to let it go; his was the the better prank after all, and Ovechkin’s flowers are only going to make Flower look good… but … it’s making his skin itch, leaving Ovechkin with the last word. That’s what happened over Boston too. It’s so unsatisfying. He drums his fingers idly, wondering. 

He picks up the phone, dials Bergeron’s room. 

_”Hey Patrice, how’s it going?_ ”

“ _Flower, good! How are the flowers?_ ” Flower laughs. Hockey players are such gossips. The only thing faster than the speed of light is the speed of gossip in the NHL.

“ _I think Ovechkin loves me! No, but seriously, a bit overwhelming. Actually… that’s what I was calling you about._ ” He pauses, tries to make his tone disinterested. “ _I don’t suppose you still have the housekeeping key?_ ”

“ _Flower, you’re not getting it back._ ” There’s laughing disbelief in Patrice’s voice. “ _God knows what you’d do with it._ ”

“ _I only want to borrow it._ ” Honestly, he’s trying not to channel his inner sulky teenager, but he doesn’t think he’s controlling it that well - that sounded like a whine, even to him. “ _I just don’t want to let Ovie have the last word and it feels like he got it with the flowers_ ”.

Patrice is quiet. “ _Ok,_ he says reluctantly. “ _But only under adult supervision. The other guys trusted me with it. What were you thinking?_ ”

“ _Nothing too creative. I was just going to steal his underwear._ ” There’s a quiet huff of laughter from the other end of the line - Flower wonders if Patrice has the same mental image as he does, of an epic Ovie rant over missing underwear. 

“ _Come down, you can raid, I’ll keep lookout._

Shortly after, Flower is entering Ovie’s room, with Patrice in the corridor keeping guard. Flower quickly finds Ovie’s case, rifling through it efficiently. Nothing. Hmmm - he wouldn’t have thought Ovie would unpack for just a weekend, but everyone has their own routines. He starts to go through the drawers in the room, checks the hanging rail in the wardrobe… still nothing. He glances back at the case - it doesn’t look like much is missing from the case. Where does Ovie keep his underwear? He quickly checks exterior pockets on bags, checks the bathroom. Nothing. He looks around perplexed - there’s nowhere else it could be. 

“Flower, hurry up!” Patrice is calling from the corridor, tapping on the door. 

He must have underwear somewhere… mustn’t he? 

And then the other explanation for there being no underwear in the room sinks in. He curses softly - there are some things you never want to know about other hockey players. 

He finds the clock in the room, sets it for 0430, turns the volume up; at least since Ovie has already been there one night, he’ll know the alarm has been messed with. Not checking any in-room clocks for random alarms set by previous guests is something you only do once as a rookie. 

He leaves the room, fast, pulling Patrice back to Bergeron’s room. 

“ _Did you get it?_ ”

Flower shakes his head not wanting to say what’s in his head. “ _I couldn’t find any!_ ”

“ _He must have some!_ ” says Patrice, looking perlexed. 

“ _Must he?_ ” Flower asks, holding Patrice’s gaze.

“ _But that would mean he’s going…_ ” Patrice breaks off, horror on his face. 

“ _Yep, commando. I really don’t want to think about that._ ”

“ _Oh god. I really didn’t want to know that._ ”

“ _How can we not think about it?_ ” Flower says. Patrice looks at him sharply, and then nods miserably. 

“ _It’s going to be like those ‘don’t push the button’ signs. You know you shouldn’t, you don’t want to think about it… but we will._ ”

“Tabernak.”

“With bells on.”

0--0--0

He has to admire the discretion of the draft organisers; the drinks on the tables are all hidden in careful little NHL paper cups that look like coffee cups. It’s only the sheer number of cups spread across the ‘backstage’ draft room which make you realise they probably aren’t coffee, or that would be one frankly wired up room of hockey players. The actual bar is tucked away to one side, carefully out of sight of the cameras. Roberto’s own personal bottle of vodka (or maybe his second) is also tucked away, carefully out of sight of the cameras. The presence of this vodka probably explains the group at his table though - it’s considerably better than anything at the bar. Roberto’s already had to stop Ovie ‘acquiring’ it once, bouncing like an overexcited three year old when he found it. Flower hopes Ovie goes before Luongo in the draft, or he doesn’t rate Roberto’s chances of consuming any large amount of it. 

The hockey players have drifted in, suited and booted (or in Segs and Stamkos’ case, suited and glittery-shoed - Flower isn’t sure whether to feel jealous of them or embarrassed for them) arranged themselves around little tables on uncomfortable stools, varying degrees of willing to socialise. Flower finds himself sat next to Seguin towards the front of the room, but closer to the bar. 

“Hey that was a great idea yesterday,” Segs says in greeting. “But what’s with you and Ovechkin?”

“Goalie thing,” says Flower aerily. “We don’t like being scored on. Why do you think Luongo helped?”

“Because he’s unhinged,” Seguin looks at him like there can be no other explanation. “But we’re good, right? I mean, I know I’ve scored on you, you wouldn’t pull a stunt like that on me?” 

Flower just smiles at him in response. He doesn’t think it’s at all accurate when others tell him that when he smiles like this he looks like a semi-friendly shark, but that doesn’t mean he can’t use it to his own advantage. 

“All goalies are unhinged,” Segs sighs with deliberate emphasis. Flower laughs at the expression on his face. 

The camera crew is circling, and from the stage out front Flower can hear cheers and applause. He’s guessing it’s some kind of warm-up though, as things are still relatively low key backstage. He glances around the room; Ovie is sitting at a table behind him, alongside Phil Kessel and Jon Tavares. He looks like he’s holding court. He catches Flower looking and grins and waves enthusiastically. 

“How did you like the flowers?” he calls across the room. 

“Beautiful,” Flower responds, not missing a beat. “But you know I’m a happily married man, no matter how much you woo me.” 

“Flower, I’m never going to give up hope, that one day, we can be together.” And he bats his eyelids at Flower, holding his hands to his heart. “I know you feel the same about me as I do about you - when will you admit your love?”

“I have the choice between Vero and you, Alex, and you wonder why I’m not with you?” Now the room is starting to listen in, laughing at the chirping. 

“You just don’t appreciate me Flower. You need to let your inner Russian out - I know you’ve got one!”

“Oh come on Alex, you know Geno feels the same way about you as I do!” Alex barks with laughter.

“Ah Flower, I shall continue to hope until my dying day!” And he makes sad pining eyes at Flower before turning back to his table, just as the TV people are making frantic hand wavey gestures and suddenly the cameras are on in the green room, Pierre McGuire babbling away.

Flower watches him a moment longer… no he just can’t see… he realises he’s staring at Alex’s butt and looks away quickly. No, he really wasn’t trying to see if he was commando or not. Not at all. Definitely not.

The third time in the evening Flower drags his eyes away from Ovie’s butt, Tyler leans across. 

“Were you really checking out his ass?” he’s grinning as he asks, privy to a secret no-one else in the room knows. Yet. Flower reckons he’s got 10 minutes max before its on Instagram or twitter. He’s tempted, just for an instant, to let Segs at it but that is going a bit far. There are limits. Probably. It is tempting, however. 

But no, Ovie kept Boston quiet. Flower reckons, bizarrely, the best way to keep Seguin quiet is to bring him in. 

“No, I wasn’t,” He pauses, biting his lip, acting uncertain. “I heard a rumour that Ovie doesn’t wear any underwear and… well… once you know, you can’t help but try to see.” 

Segs rears back, giggling in surprise. 

“Oh man and you had to tell me that, didn’t you?” Seguin is not as stupid as he’s sometimes made out to be. Flower looks him in the eye, notices his gaze drifting to his left, towards where Ovie is sat at the back and smirks at him. 

“See? He’s irresistible now.” 

“You,” and Seguin stops and points at Flower for extra emphasis, “Are a fucking fucker. So have you been able to tell yet?”

“No,” Flower says sadly. “There’s just not a clear enough view from here.”

“Fuck man, I need to know!”

Shortly after, Seguin is drafted by Foligno’s team, and Flower goes back to sit next to Halak. He doesn’t know the guy well, apart from to know he’s another goalie, and he’s looking a little bit lost. Besides, this way he can keep a closer eye on Ovechkin, who is sat at the same table. He still can’t decide though if Ovie is commando or not, no sign of anything to confirm or deny it. 

Ovie welcomes him to the table with an exuberant “You give me hope!” a kiss on both cheeks and some vodka. He’s making a big show of wanting to be picked last because he wants the car. He’s refusing to tell the other players why he is so hung up on it, insisting he needs it because he’s poor and can’t afford to buy himself a new one, giving ridiculous reason after ridiculous reason as to why he can’t afford to buy himself one. So far Flower has heard him claim that he gambled it all away, lost it all investing in space tourism, drank it all away, gave it all to animal charities while drunk with Geno (this last with a glare at Flower as though it’s somehow his fault), spent too much on flowers (this also with a glare at Flower) for people he loved and spent it all on plastic surgery. Even the chips about the car not being quite Ovie’s usual style are met with sad puppy dog eyes and a ‘beggars can’t be choosers’ comment. 

Ovie is just launching into another explanation as to why he has no money (he was apparently storing it under his bed and squirrels broke in and ate it), when Flower realises he’s just been drafted. He wasn’t actually paying attention, only hears “From the Pittsburgh Penguins!” as Ovie points at him, so doesn’t know which team chose him, makes his way out onto the stage to find that he’s on Team Foligno. Trying to sneak by without being interviewed fails, but it’s not like they’re out to embarrass the players, so he gives Sid-like answers of general nice vagueness, does not detail exactly what fun he’s been having this weekend and goes to join Byfuglien.. oh, and Giroux. Ah well. Into every All-Stars, a little rain must fall. Segs grins at him as he sits down. 

“Any luck?” he whispers so half the team hears. Flower shakes his head at him. Subtlety is really not his strong point. 

“No. But it is hard to prove a negative.”

“We’ve got this man. We are going to find out.” The rest of the team are staring at them now. Segs waves at them “Butt out!” And then starts giggling to himself. 

Flower sighs. Really, no subtlety at all. 

Giroux looks between them. 

“Negative? You mean the tests were clear? You don’t need the antibiotics? Segs will be sooo relieved.” He grins, broadly, and there are grunts of laughter up and down the benches. 

“Your momma too!” Seguin bites back without a pause, mouth grinning, but eyes fierce. Flower laughs - sometimes the simple, childish put downs are the best. 

There’s a buzz of excitement from the auditorium. The hosts are shouting excitedly about a trade and the guys at the desks are looking very pleased with themselves. The chatter from the benches dies down as they start to pay attention again. Flower focuses back on what’s happening with the draft, hears Seguin traded for Kessel. He thinks it’s about equal for him which one he’d rather have on side - both love to score and he has to try and stop them, usually. But the symbolism - the symbolism is great. Segs is grinning and laughing as he swaps places with Kessel. 

Eventually, Ovie is chosen; much to his disgust he doesn’t get the car. He’s mellow though on stage; Flower suspects there will be a lot missing from Roberto’s vodka bottle. But it’s Seguin who really catches Flower’s attention. Thanks to to the trade, Segs is now sat closest to Ovie as he does his interview and stares at him throughout it with laughing concentration. Seguin seems to be on a determined mission to confirm; Flower wonders for the first time if telling him was a mistake. And as Ovie turns to walk towards the seats, Seguin turns very obviously to catch Flowers’ eye, pulls a mock face of absolute horror and then laughs himself stupid. 

Well, that would be a no then. Flower rests his head in his hands. This really was something he didn’t want to have confirmed. Ever. 

“Aww Flower, you don’t look happy to have me on your side! You should be relieved I won’t be scoring on you!” Ovie is grinning at him, gap-toothed and happy. 

“As if you could,” Flower mutters in response. And then he really can’t contain his curiosity anymore. “So go on then, why did you want the car so much?”

“Well I told you, I’m broke….” there’s a groan of complaint from the seats around them. “Ok, I tell you real reason. I wanted to give it to a kiddies charity to use for transporting kit.”

There’s a contemplative silence as they look at Ovie and decide that this time, he is actually being sincere. 

“Fuck man, that would have been a nice gesture.” Flower doesn’t see who says it, but agrees. 

“Oh it’s ok,” Ovie grins at them. “Bet I get one anyway when the sponsor finds out. Lots of publicity for them! Just a shame one of the babies still got selected last. Not so good for them.” He shrugs, picking up his drink. 

Sometimes, Flower reflects, you can find out many things about a person in an evening. Somethings you don’t want to know because you want to disinfect your brain with bleach, and other things you don’t want to know because it causes you to remember that underneath someone’s outwardly cocky and brash persona, there’s actually a fairly decent human being. 

Of course, he’d probably die before he admitted that to Ovie. Or allowed it to stop him trying to prank him…

0--0--0

There’s an odd noise dragging him out from his sleep. It’s persistent and all he wants to do is sleep… As he comes around, he realises that it’s the hotel phone. It’s still dark outside, dark within the room, and in the gloom, his phone is showing the time as 0431. He reaches over and picks up the phone, grunting down into it. Speech is beyond him. 

“ _Flower, you never said anything about setting his alarm. He’s in the next fucking room! If I’m awake in the middle of the night, you’re awake in the middle of the night._ ” 

For a moment, Flower has no idea what is going on. Who is on the phone. Where he is. Or even who he is. 

And then it comes crashing back in on him. Oh. Bergeron. Ovie’s alarm. 

“ _Sorry. Didn’t think,_ ” he mutters into the phone, and then hangs up, hoping it’s enough, and he can slide back into the sleep that is fuzzing his mind seductively. 

It appears to be enough. Bergeron’s assured he’s awake too. The phone doesn’t ring again. 

0--0--0

Skills. 

Fuck. He could really do without this. The team had had a practice in the morning, trying to take a disparate bunch of random players and turn them into a group which could actually play together. It’s a task harder than he had thought it would be, trying to mesh different styles and systems. 

It’s fun though, watching Foligno trying to sort out the mess of assigning players to the different skills competitions. Flower has honestly never seen so much pouting. He and Carey have decided who would do what for the goalies; it wasn’t like goalies had much to do in skills - one event each and then the shootout. Try to stop the players scoring after showing off their pretty moves, but even then no-one really noticed if they do or don’t, then try to score themselves. How can you like a skills competition where there’s no recognition of the art of goalkeeping? All that matters in skills is skating, puck-handling and shooting. The real skill on the ice is goalkeeping. But the Philistines who run skills don’t agree and think the flashier stuff is better. So they’re stuck with it. 

Foligno had rolled his eyes at them when they had told him which goalie would be doing what, united so he couldn’t mess up their plan. Fortunately he’d been too busy refereeing a disagreement between Stamkos and Giroux as to who would do the breakaway challenge to complain. 

Which kind of leaves Flower at leisure until the Skills in the evening. He can still feel the itch of annoyance about the flowers, even though the retirement community they’d been sent to had loved them. Somehow just messing with Ovie’s alarm doesn’t seem that big a deal. While he could fill Ovie’s room with sheep, it doesn’t seem that original. If only he could get hold of a real sheep.. now that would be a prank which would eclipse Vancouver! 

And then, like that, he’s googling ‘petting zoo Columbus’. It’s just in the spirit of curiosity obviously. He just wants to know if you can hire a real live sheep in Ohio. Apparently you can. He drums his fingers on the table, staring into space. Purely as a theoretical exercise, of course, he starts to consider how best to deploy a real sheep to annoy Ovie. Obviously hotel room would be fun, but he doesn’t see Patrice giving him the key when he realises it might involve being kept awake by the sound of a sheep. And anyway, not much of an audience… locker room would be better. Flower grins at the mental image of a sheep wandering around the locker room. 

Without really thinking too much, he’s phoning the petting zoo. 

“I’m wondering if I can have a sheep delivered to the Nationwide Centre tomorrow afternoon before the All Stars game, and then collected after the game?” His tone is neutral, like this is a perfectly normal request. 

There’s a laugh at the other end of the line. 

“Seriously, man? No.” But the voice sounds intrigued. 

“Are you a hockey fan?” Flower asks. 

“Well, yeah, man but that doesn’t make a difference.”

“Ok, but the sheep won’t be harmed. We want it as a mark of respect for one of the players! And I’m sure, since you are a fan, we can find something to make it worth your while?” There’s a pause on the line. Flower grins… that pause holds a world of promise.

Flower gets down to some serious haggling. By the end he has the promise of a sheep, to be delivered, for the princely sum of some game tickets and a game jersey signed by as many players as Flower is able to get. He’d had to admit to the farm guy he wasn’t sure he’d be able to get Ovechkin’s - something the guy had laughed at. Flower quickly calls the All Star game PR to arrange the tickets - luckily he’s in good odour with them thanks to the flowers - and then pulls out the Team Toews jersey with his name on it, grabs a sharpie and starts doing the rounds of the hockey players to get it signed ‘as a cool memento’.

Except everyone he asks seems to think it’s a great idea and start tagging along with their spare jerseys. They reach about ten players crowded in the corridor outside Stamkos’s room and it’s starting to look like a Trick or Treat crowd, NHL player style. He thinks Gaudreau might even have tried to dress up, looking at what he’s wearing. Stamkos takes one look, hears the (multiple) requests and explanation and bursts out laughing. 

“Are you going to have the entire NHL All Star roster wandering door to door? Why don’t you call around and get people to come here?” He’s shaking his head. He is right though. And with a phone tree set up, it seems like the entire NHL All Star contingent is converging on Stamkos’s room. It quickly fills to capacity, everyone signing jerseys on any available surface. Stamkos looks around proudly. 

“Way better guys, but I’ll get us more space, Tazer’s room is next door” he says, walking into the hallway. Two minutes later Tazer is following him back into the room through the connecting door. 

“It’s fucking inefficient though,” Tazer is frowning at the milling hockey players, trying to work out who still needs to sign their shirts. “Why don’t you put all the jerseys in a pile, and pass them around? Do it as a chain. Be much quicker, otherwise we could be here for days. Particularly if Luongo starts passing around that bottle of vodka he’s just brought in.” Tazer’s even managed to scrounge up a couple of silver pens for the dark Team Foligno shirts. Flower just shakes his head in wonderment. He really only needed his own shirt signed. 

And that is how pretty much the entire NHL All Star roster end up signing each other’s shirts like fanboys, having been barked at and bullied by Jonathan Toews, serial organiser and hater of inefficiency, into forming a production chain line of hockey players earnestly signing each others’ shirts. The entire thing takes less than an hour. Flower is watching him with something like awe; everyone knows you just can’t do that with hockey players. There’s a lot of laughter and chirping going on about what they are doing, but there’s also a universal feeling that it’s a damn fine idea. 

Flower has even got Ovechkin’s signature on the shirt he is sadly going to lose in exchange for the temporary ownership of a sheep. The fact there is a little heart and a kiss drawn under Ovie’s name, added with a grin when he saw whose shirt he was signing, might take some explaining to the future owner. 

It will still be worth it though. 

0--0--0

Skills is funny and awful at the same time. It is as bad as Carey and he had expected; they’ve not been able to stay warmed up, it’s all very drawn out and watching hockey players playing with their sticks is never that exciting. But ok, it has its moments, and their team wins. Watching Kessel nonchalantly beat Seguin in the speed challenge is not only satisfying but nets Flower a nice payday in the bet he had with Luongo. Flower is charmed by Kessel’s apparent surprise at the win, notices his pleased smile when he comes back over to join his team afterwards. 

The breakaway challenge is always pretty fun to watch - Flower has to admit a grudging respect for Giroux’s puck handling even if he is wearing orange, and he likes the fact there are two small children involved, even if one does play for the NHL. 

But frankly he’s glad when it’s over, and he can stop sitting around and chill out back at the hotel. He gets to his room, changes and heads out to meet Carey and Patrice for a couple of drinks in the hotel bar before their unofficial curfew kicks in. 

As he pulls the door open, there’s a crash from outside, and his feet and ankles are suddenly covered in water. Without thinking he’s flinging himself back into the room to where his iPad is lying on the floor, charging. He measures his length in the tide of cold water pouring into the room, but manages to raise the iPad out of the danger zone before the water reaches it. Unfortunately, he’s now lying face down on the wet carpet, soaked. 

“Tabernak de callisse!” Fucking Ovie! Really, fuck him. 

Getting carefully to his feet, he surveys the damage. The floor of the room is pretty wet now, and there’s an overturned bucket lying in the doorway. Glaringly obvious, it’s got a big #8 written on it - as though there were any doubt at all who was responsible for this. 

Flower gets the towels from the bathroom with a deep, put upon sigh and then calls housekeeping for lots more. They arrive in about five minutes, and the housekeeping staff even helps him with the mop up. Only when the room is much drier does he change out of his own soaked clothing.

It’s a crap prank. It’s really about the oldest, simplest prank in the world and he’d assumed most people had grown out of it by the time they left juniors. But he also knows he’s been well and truly caught by it. He’s tempted to text Ovechkin to tell him how crap and simplistic it is, but knows Ovie will love that too much. Somehow he keeps his phone in his pocket, safely out of temptation. 

0--0--0

Two hours later, he’s still fulminating to Carey and Patrice about how crap a prank it is when Ovie wanders over, a massive grin on his face. 

“Flowers need water,” is all he says. “I was worried you weren’t getting enough. Got to keep my second favourite goalie hydrated!”

Flower splutters; the other hockey players are laughing now. Price shakes his head grinning. “You two are such a thing. The romance of the ages… I’m not sure I can take much more pining.”

“What the fuck?! Et tu Pricey?” Flower glares at him. Carey grins back, unrepentant. 

“They should just get a room and be done with,” Giroux chimes in and what the fuck was he doing here anyway? “Although that might make Seguin jealous!” Seguin looks across at him, brow raised. 

“Sounds exactly like a party I’d like to crash actually!” He flashes a charming, innocent and yet at the same time downright filthy grin at Giroux. They’re fast learning that Seguin will out brazen anyone, anywhere, anytime and do it with a charming smile too. Flower thinks it’s time to intervene, waving his left hand at them, managing to flip them off with it at the same time. 

“Married, remember? Happily married! Sorry to disappoint!” Ovie flings himself to his knees, head in his hands, apparent howls of grief wailing out of him. 

“There is no hope… my life is over!” He swipes Flower’s drink from the table in front of him and downs it. “Although, I do really wonder if you are Russian enough for me, you are separated from your drinks way too easily. And your taste in booze is shocking!”

There is little that Flower can do except roll his eyes at him and wonder if he should keep a glass of sambuca to hand as Ovie-bait. Then he’d really have something to complain about. 

Ovechkin pulls up a chair and joins them, ordering himself a vodka. 

“Where’s mine?” Flower looks over at him. 

“You’re a rich goalie. I’m poor remember!” Ovie grins at him. 

“How do you expect my taste in booze to improve if you won’t help?!”

“I’m always an optimist Flower, you should know that by now! I’m sure you can figure it out - just listen to your Russian side.” His vodka arrives and he carefully places it well away from Flower. Flower growls. 

“I don’t have a Russian side.”

“Just stop fighting it, listen to your inner voice, we know from your acts it is there, it will come.” 

And with that Ovechkin downs his shot, placing the glass firmly back on the table. Their conversation is interrupted by the arrival of Tazer. There are shouts of welcome when he turns up, but within about five minutes he’s guilt tripped his team members into giving up and going off to bed. Foligno wanders over shortly after he’s done, to be treated with a bit more suspicion from his team members. 

“Are you going to do the same to us?” Carey voices their suspicion. 

“No, I know I don’t need to. I know you’re all professionals who know where your limits are the night before a game, and you’d hate to be beaten by Tazer’s team because you guys were hungover and his team wasn’t.” Foligno grins at them broadly, radiating innocence. There are moans, groans and mutters in response. 

“Nick! You really are taking your captaincy to heart,” exclaims Ovechkin, gazing at him. “Hey, don’t get embarrassed, it’s a good thing! And from one captain to another, that was a really good way to handle this situation.”

At Ovechkin’s words, drawing attention to Foligno’s slight blush, it intensifies. “But you do have the easy job,” Ovechkin continues. “Tazer has to keep Luongo away from his vodka. He takes the ‘All Stars is better with alcohol’ very seriously.”

Looking at the expression on Foligno’s face, Flower is glad of the proof that it’s not just him with Ovechkin. He’s tempted to order one more beer, just because, but feels like Foligno needs a break too. Besides, he has a sheep to take delivery of tomorrow. 

0--0--0

The room is dark and quiet, but Flower is dragged out of sleep by an insistent knocking on the door which won’t go away. He mumbles into his pillow, but it’s still there, won’t stop, just keeps going on and on. He drags himself out of bed, and goes to answer it, trying to prise his eyes open enough so he won’t trip over anything in his rather messy room. 

“Room Service!” The hotel staff are all too bright and cheery as they push past him, wheeling a trolley into the room. 

“What the fuck? I didn’t order any breakfast… “ he stares at them groggily, bemused. No, he’s sure he didn’t request breakfast. “What time is it?”

“Six o’clock Sir! And here’s your order sheet.” He glances down at it; it’s clearly not in his handwriting, but it is also clearly for his room. He sighs deeply. “Also we were asked to deliver this note from another guest.” The staff member holds out a white envelope, which Flower stares at as though it’s a poisoned snake, and then takes from him gingerly. He moves back, giving them free access, while he opens it. 

_**Flowers need fed too!  
#8 **_

He drops the note onto the floor, glancing at what Ovie has chosen for him. It’s not too bad, although he probably could have done without the smoked fish stinking up his… oh yeah. Of course some of it would be chosen to be annoying. At least there isn’t any… oh no, there is champagne too. He somehow remembers to tip the staff, and then looks at the large quantity of food set out in front of him. Sleep is preferable to eating right now but it’s here and it’s hot and he’s paying through the nose for it so he might as well eat it and then go back to bed. 

He thinks Ovechkin has probably wisely unplugged his in-room phone, so there’s no point trying to call him now to invite him over. On the other hand… eating breakfast with Ovie in pyjamas at this time? Maybe not. Seems way more intimate than Flower is willing to get. And after the underwear thing, who knows if Ovechkin even wears pyjamas. And there’s a thought Flower could really have done without. 

0--0--0

In morning practice they are slowly getting some sort of system worked out. Flower hopes it will be enough, knows defence is going to be ropey with no ability to check or hit, but all he can do is work on his own game, and hope there will be enough support - something the other goalies are in agreement on. Elliott seems more thrilled to be there than you’d expect from someone having just had to fly back in at no notice from the Turks and Caicos; Carey is Carey, focussed and dry and watching everything. He’ll lead the opening period, Flower will take the middle and Elliott will hopefully close it out for them. 

As he’s leaving the ice, Toews’s team is coming on. Flower catches Seguin for a moment. 

“Could you give me a hand with something this afternoon?” He tries for casual. Tyler doesn’t buy it for a moment. 

“What are you up to? Is this another Vancouver?” He’s laughing as he says it, unconcerned. 

“You weren’t even at Vancouver! What would you know?” Flower pauses. “Anyway, it will be better than Vancouver.” And that silences Seguin, unexpectedly. Flower hadn’t been sure anything could. 

“Yeah the reason I don’t know about Vancouver is that no-one ever says what happened there. But they all blame whatever they aren’t willing to tell anyone else about squarely on you. It’s like fight club. ‘We don’t talk about Vancouver’. You’ve traumatised an entire Olympic gold medal winning team to the point that the hockey players who were there won’t talk about what happened and blanche when it gets mentioned and now you’re asking me if I’ll help on something you say will be better?” He stares at Flower in disbelief. Flower feels a shiver of disappointment running through him; when you put it like that… “Of course I’m going to fucking help!” Seguin is grinning again, all bouncing, bright, uncontained excitement. “Just tell me when and where and what we’re doing.”

And just like that, Flower feels his plan coming together perfectly. 

0--0--0

Perfect could have been too optimistic a word for it. 

They’d managed to get the sheep into Nationwide Centre through one of the loading bays out back, surprisingly unseen. Sheep guy had been delighted with his sweater and tickets, and said he’d be there post-game to get the sheep back to the farm. 

He hadn’t counted on the sheep not having a lead to pull it to where they wanted it to be. 

He hadn’t counted on the sheep having a mind of its own and not just following along behind them like, well, sheep. Sheep guy had muttered something about it being a bit belligerent because it was a male - it certainly isn’t the calm placid creature he had thought sheep were meant to be. 

Nevertheless, he and Seguin have the sheep somewhere in the Nationwide Centre and are herding it vaguely in the direction of the locker room. When it wants to go in that direction. Which is at least some of the time. 

“Are you sure we aren’t lost?” Seguin dashes to one side to stop the sheep heading down an interesting looking side corridor. 

“No, we aren’t lost.” Flower remains behind the sheep, pushing its truculent form, step by step, from behind. This is even worse than sled training. 

“It’s just we’ve come down this corridor in the opposite direction.”

“Yeah, when we did that, we were lost. Now we’re not. We should be going this way.”

“And you know that how?”

“Tyler, how long have I been playing in this league? How often have I played in the Nationwide Centre since the Jackets are in my fucking division?”

Seguin just looks at him, brow raised.

Flower sighs.“Well if we didn’t find the locker room going in the other direction it stands to fucking reason it must be in this direction, and so we can’t be lost.’

“I meant lost as in not knowing where we are,” Seguin says.

“We’re still not lost. We know we are in this corridor, so we know where we are,” Flower insists.

“Man, I start to see why Vancouver is such a thing!” Seguin sighs, exasperated. Flower glares at him, but pauses as they come to a T junction in the corridor. 

“Right, so if we aren’t lost, which way is it now?” Seguin joins him in hanging onto the sheep, while looking up and down the corridor. Flower hesitates. As he does so, a voice echoes out the corridor, answering his question unexpectedly.

“It’s right. Definitely right.” Flower jumps as a tall, rangy, jean-clad figure moves out from where he’d been lurking, unseen.

“What the fuck are you two doing with a sheep? And why have you been walking it around the building for the last half hour?”

“Pricey!” Seguin gasps. “Fuck man! Don’t do that! Seriously, don’t, you nearly gave me a heart attack!” He leans back against the wall in relief, at which point the sheep tries to leg it down the left-hand corridor, only to be stopped by Flower throwing himself on it. After he’s got the sheep stationary again he straightens up as much as he can. 

“But you know what we’re doing with the sheep - we’re taking it to the locker room. Why have you been stalking us?” Flower responds, looking at Carey consideringly, and a little bit annoyed that they’ve been observed for so long without him actually noticing. 

“The locker room? But…” and Carey tails off, staring into space. “Ohhh, Ovechkin! Nice one Flower! Flowers… sheep.. nice symmetry.” He looks at them again. “I couldn’t believe what I was seeing at first, and after that it was just funny watching you fail at sheep herding. I’ve got some great video. But we’ve a game to play today. At this rate, you’re not going to make it. Want a hand getting it to the locker room?” 

“Fuck Pricey, I could kiss you right now!” Seguin exclaims with enthusiasm. “Sheep are more annoying than I’d have thought possible. It’s even worse than Flower!”

“Wait here, I’ll go get some sticks and bring them back.” And he’s sprinting off down the corridors. Seguin looks at Flower. 

“Sticks?” Flower shrugs. He has no idea either, but they don’t have long to wait until Carey is back with three of Seguin’s hockey sticks. 

“Why mine?”

“We only have goalie sticks, and they’ll won’t work so well.”

“But what if I’m completely superstitious like Crosby… “ his eyes grow round, “Flower, is it true that Crosby… “

“Yes,” Flower interrupts quickly. He doesn’t want to get into Sid’s stick superstitions, not with an outsider, even after the sheep. Seguin looks at him, eyes wider. 

Carey interrupts them both. “Look use the sticks to keep the sheep moving in the direction you want and stop it going where you don’t want. I really don’t know why you didn’t think of this yourselves!”

Flower sighs. “Because I don’t spend my summers playing with farm animals. Dedicated city boy, me!” Carey is right however. The sheep becomes a lot more cooperative when herded using hockey sticks and within a relatively short space of time, they have moved it along into the Team Foligno locker room. Rounding up some spare equipment ties and straps with stick tape, they manage to create a tie for it, attaching it to Ovie’s stall. Once the sheep is safely installed, they stand back to admire it. It doesn’t look happy, staring at them and trying to move away from the stall, pulling on its ties. 

“We need to get him some water - we can’t leave him here with none,” is Carey’s practical suggestion and starts looking around for a bowl or dish he can use.

“Ovechkin’s helmet?” Flower suggests innocently. Price actually considers it, then shakes his head. 

“Yeah, probably best not, he’ll likely go ballistic enough without giving him a helmet covered in sheep slobber too.” Carey’s grinning as he says it though. 

“Was that meant to talk me into it or out of it?” Flower asks to a burst of laughter from Seguin. He’s been busy taking pictures of the sheep in front of Ovechkin’s stall, and has even managed to get a selfie with it. 

“No twitter, no instagram,” warns Flower. 

“Yeah, I know. Such a shame though,” says Seguin sadly. “You need to film his reaction for me though. Actually, I’d better get moving before anyone finds me in here!” He retrieves his sticks and pauses in the door “Don’t forget to show me what happens - I’m not doing this sheep wrangling for nothing!”

The locker room seems immeasurably quieter once he has left. The sheep finally stops fighting and settles down in Ovie’s stall with a grunt, apparently for a nap. Carey and Flower look at it. 

“Why did you get involved?” Flower asks Carey curiously. Carey’s a nice guy, it’s not something Flower could have seen him helping with. 

“It’s the All Star weekend. Why not? Luongo drinks, you play pranks on Ovechkin, apparently I sheep wrangle and get drawn into your prank wars. We cope in different ways!” With that he does actually go off to get the sheep some water. Flower checks his watch; just about time for a pre-game snack and then they can come back and do media. And watch Ovie meet the sheep. 

0--0--0

Without actually talking about it, Price and Flower find themselves the first of the players into the locker room before the game. They’d got their pre-game meal together, seeing other players gradually arriving into the eating area. But they really don’t want to miss reactions in the locker room. Besides, as goalies, they generally are first to arrive for their respective teams, just because they have more kit to put on. 

They enter the locker room to find two of the equipment guys and one of the coaches staring at the sheep which is staring belligerently back at them. Flower raises an eyebrow at Carey, to be met by a slight nod. 

“Tabernak, what the hell is a sheep doing in the locker room?” Flower says loudly and incredulously. Carey walks over to the where they are standing staring at the sheep. 

“What the fuck man?” is all Carey says then pulls out his phone to take a picture of the sheep. Ok, it’s not his first, but the staff aren’t to know that. The equipment staff look at them both. 

“We don’t know, we were hoping some of you players might? We came in, and the sheep was just here!” 

“Not us man - we’ve only just arrived!” Carey shrugs, Flower nodding behind him. Just as they are proclaiming their lack of knowledge, Price holding out his hand for the sheep to sniff, Foligno and Joey enter the room too and stop dead, staring at the sheep. 

“What the fuck?” Foligno splutters. Flower smiles to himself. That, or some variant is probably going to be the most asked question in the locker room this evening. Carey grins at him. 

“Looks like we have a team mascot Nick!” Joey snorts a laugh. Foligno shakes his head in disbelief, looking over at Flower suspiciously. Flower stops himself from starting to protest his innocence, knowing that will just make him look guilty. Instead he glances at Foligno and then turns away to start laying out his kit. He does still have a game to dress for. 

“What the hell do we do with it?” one of the equipment guys says. “We can’t leave it here”

“It seems to be pretty safely restrained,” response Carey nonchalantly. “Sheep don’t like to be messed with too much and that’s a ram. Do you have a better place for it? He might get violent if he feels uncomfortable and he looks pretty happy here” He sounds smooth and knowledgeable and uncaring; like he’s a vaguely interested bystander, nothing to do with getting a sheep into a NHL locker room at all. Flower wonders how he got so good at smooth faced innocence. He’s basically providing the equipment guys with all the justification they need not to get involved, and they’re pretty happy at that. 

The equipment guys look at Price, look at each other. 

“I don’t know,” one says. “I don’t know anything about sheep.”

“Oh I’ve helped with them from time to time, but I wouldn’t call myself an expert,” responds Carey. And just like that, he’s established himself as the expert in the room. Flower has to stop his jaw hanging open. This is Carey ‘I’m such a nice guy, there’s not a mean bone in my body’ Price and he’s managing their prank like he was born to it. Flower glances at him, eyes narrowed, re-evaluating him. 

More of their team are drifting in now as Flower puts his kit on. As expected, hockey players are not that original in their exclamations of surprise when faced with a real live sheep in their locker room, although most, once they realise whose stall it is tied to, are quick to see the joke. No small number, when they work it out, look over to Flower; he keeps his face bland and only vaguely interested. 

“But what are we going to do with it when the media come in?” Foligno asks worriedly. He really does want everything to go well - it’s the Jackets big showcase. He looks over towards Carey. Carey shrugs. 

“We can shut it up in the showers then. You know, barricade it in a stall? Should be fine, might even be a bit cooler for it, we don’t want it overheating. ‘Sheep dies in locker room accident’ is probably not what we want tomorrow’s headlines to be!” He’s smiling as he says it, calm and authoritative, and Foligno nods along. Flower starts to realise that not only is it the day they smuggled a sheep into the All Star locker room (and he has to hide his grin at that thought), it’s also the day Carey Price misdirected the entire room into doing what he wanted them to without any of them realising what was happening. He looks at Price with new respect, only to catch Carey’s eye and receive an eyebrow quirk in return. He looks like he’s enjoying himself hugely. 

Stamkos laughs from his stall where he’s part dressed, phone in hand. 

“Ovie’s coming. If you want to get his reaction be ready with your phones!” he says, placing his phone back down on the stall while he settles some pads. 

“How do you know?” Burnie asks. 

“Got Drouin to keep a look out, he’s going to get here just ahead of him. Got to be some benefit of having our rookie on the team!” and he grins to himself. 

Team work, Flower reflects, makes stuff like this so much better. 

The door opens and they all turn to watch who comes in next. Drouin hitches in the doorway, surprised at the stares coming his way. Even on draft day, he probably wasn’t the subject of such intense stares. 

“Come in Jon, quick - you really don’t want to miss this!” says Stamkos, grinning at him. Drouin moves towards his stall, tripping slightly as he stares at the sheep. The sheep watches him move across the room, unblinking. Just as Drouin reaches his stall, the door is opened again. 

“Hey guys!” says Ovie enthusiastically and then grinds to a halt when he sees the sheep in his stall. “What the fuck?” He moves closer - the sheep jumps to its feet and stamps warningly. “Oh how cute!” His voice is rising, sounding excited. “I have a sheep in my stall! Does it have a name?” He bounces towards it, hand outstretched, oblivious to the jaws dropping around the locker room, the phones raised capturing the moment. The sheep stamps again, tries to butt at Ovie. He bounces back a little. “Don’t be afraid little sheep, we won’t harm you!” He holds his hand out towards the sheep again, which sniffs a little at it. “Awww see, it does like me!” 

There’s a suppressed snort someplace in the room. 

“How could it not? You might be brothers!” Doughty is grinning hugely. That sets the room off… 

“You do look alike!” Giroux calls across. “Same sad eyes, same bad hair, same bad breath.” There are various baaahhing and mehhhing noises coming from all points too. Ovechkin looks across at Giroux. 

“The sheep has great hair! Don’t be unkind to the sheep!” He pets at the sheep which ducks its head, swinging it out of reach. 

The chirping and laughter are interrupted by the PR person storming into the room juggling papers and phones. He’s staring at a sheet of paper in front of him and talking as he walks.

“So ok, we have the media due in for some pre-match interviews; Foligno, Price and Giroux you’re up for TV. Ovechkin and …” He trails to a halt, staring at the sheep in disbelief. Drops his phones and papers. Wipes his eyes. The sheep gazes back at him, impassive. Ovechkin moves to rub its back, reassuringly.

“Why the fuck is there a sheep in the locker?” The PR guy whispers urgently, moving forward to touch the sheep gently. It stamps again. The guys in the room look at each other. Their PR is about to have a breakdown, and no-one actually really knows why there is a sheep in the locker room. It’s just one of the mysteries of hockey locker-rooms they’ve kind of accepted without a second thought. There is a sheep. It is in the locker room. 

“Hey it’s ok, we talked it over with the equipment guys and agreed to barricade it in a shower while the media were here. Keep it out the way you know. It’ll be cooler as well for the sheep,” Price steps once more into the breach, voice low and reassuring, exuding confidence. Flower watches him work his magic once more, the PR guy relaxing and nodding and forgetting that he’d asked an entirely different question. 

“Strange,” says Ovie thoughtfully, glancing over towards Flower. “I thought Flower would know more about sheep than Pricey.” Flower meets his eyes, trying to show no reaction. Alex smiles back at him knowingly. Flower can feel the tenseness around the locker room, like an indrawn breath, waiting to see what happens. 

“I’m a city boy, Pricey’s a country boy. Of course he knows more about sheep.”

“Probably helped a few guys out with them from time to time, I imagine,” Ovie grins broadly at them both.

Carey nods seriously. “Not often, mainly cattle. But from time to time. I’m not an expert.”

“Not like you Ovie!” Flower can’t help but chime in. Too little chirping will look suspicious. 

Ovechkin grins. “But of course not! Anyone want a selfie with the sheep?!” and before anyone can stop him, he’s crouched next to the sheep, angling his phone. There’s a sudden stampede towards the sheep which freaks out until enfolded into Brent Burns long and capable arms and forced to have its photo taken with half the All Star players. 

“NO you can’t do that!! Don’t dare share that. We can’t have this getting out!” - the sound of freaking out PR people is always music to his ears. Flower is transported back to Vancouver as he grins towards Ovie’s phone, surrounded by his team. He gives it an even 50:50 the story leaks, particularly once Ovie sends them all the photo as he’s currently promising to. 

0--0--0

The sheep had been surprisingly resistant to leaving Ovie’s stall. Ovie had maintained this was because they had bonded like brothers. But it had not proved feisty enough to escape half a dozen determined hockey players manhandling it into the end shower with the plan of blocking it in with equipment bags. Flower had tried to stay back and observe until he had felt himself being physically shoved forward into the fray. Glancing behind him, Keith is standing there, nodding towards the sheep. 

“You brought this, you wrangle it,” he says, matter of factly. Then interrupts Flower as he starts to open his mouth to protest his innocence. “Don’t even go there. It’s obvious you’re behind this, how long have I known you, Flower? You’re helping move it into the shower.” Buff is standing next to him, nodding. Flower holds up his hands, rolling his eyes at them. 

“Ok, since you asked so nicely!” and he steps forward, gathering his blocker and helps direct the sheep under Carey’s instructions. Ovie is standing back watching, making sure they are being kind to his sheep and maintaining a running commentary on the hockey players actions, which has the other players not involved in the sheep translocation laughing out loud as he critiques their strategy, their moves, their swearing and general effectiveness. At the end of it all he leads the locker room in a round of applause. 

“Thank you gentlemen, if ever I need a sheep moved, I know where to turn to!” Ovie says mockingly. Pricey does a mocking bow in his direction. 

Nugget looks confused. “But what happens to it at the end of the game? We can’t just leave it there!” he asks. 

Foligno laughs. “I’m sure that won’t be a problem. The locker room provideth, the locker room taketh away, isn’t that so guys?” and he looks around the room, making sure to make eye contact with Flower and Price. Flower just grins at him, refusing to acknowledge but also relieved that Pricey hasn’t fooled everyone. “Someone will have made plans to get it in; plans will have been made to get it out again. Contrary to appearances today, sheep don’t just appear from thin air.” 

“I’ll be sad to see it go, we were just getting acquainted,” mutters Ovechkin, sadly. “Our blossoming friendship, destroyed!”

“It might write Ovie!” Flower really can’t help himself. 

Just as he finishes saying it, the PR guy comes back into the room, blowing an audible sigh of relief when there is no evidence of any sheep, warning them of the impending arrival of the media crowd for pre-game reactions. 

0--0--0

In the first period, Flower sits on the bench, trying to maintain focus. It’s an odd feeling, like being a back-up but with the knowledge that he definitely has to play later. Around him, guys are analysing lines and attacks and strategies; chirping each other and the other team, passing information on the other team… 

“Watch for the 91 line, it’s lethally quick! I thought they’d overskate that pass, but not a chance!” 

“Seabs keeps playing out of position when he’s on ice with Weber, try going down the boards when he does that, I’m not sure he’ll be able to recover.”

He tunes it out again. All he has to do is stop the pucks. That’s all. Be aware of what is happening, what is coming and stop the pucks. He reaches for his water, tilts it up… and gets a facefull of water from it, and the loosened top into his face for added injury to insult. Too late, he closes his eyes, drops the bottle, feeling the water drip and run along his face and neck, before wiping it off with a towel. There’s silence from the bench next to him, then a gust of laughter which quickly spreads along the bench as what they saw gets recounted. Yes, he has just been caught by one of the oldest tricks on the rink and of course his teammates noticed. He smiles through gritted teeth, acknowledges he’s been well caught, hating it, hating the feeling of stupidity. 

Ovie skates along in front of their bench grinning hugely at him, thumbs held up. 

“Keep hydrated Flower!” 

Fucker. 

He goes back to trying to put his game head on again. 

0--0--0

Pricey keeps things all square going into the second, matching Luongo so it’s 4-4. He’s put in a good solid performance, even managing to talk to the commentators as he’s making saves. Flower would love to say it's showboating, but it’s really just Pricey being Pricey. 

Flower has a nightmare of a period. He gets absolutely no chance to settle in, allowing a goal 24 seconds into the second period. Their only saving grace is that Giroux and Kane (and who’d have thought he’d ever be grateful to those guys!) get one back eight seconds later tying it up at 5-5. But then the 91 line comes charging down upon him again about a minute later and he’s picking the puck out the net and trying to clear his head again. He’s too unsettled now, and he needs his own D to settle him and give him some space, and he’s having to use these borrowed guys he doesn’t know and can’t bring himself to trust. Stamkos gets another back, and then it’s open season on his goal. He’s sure he should have some defence someplace on the ice, but it certainly doesn’t feel like he has any; they’re constantly several metres behind the Team Toews breakaways. By the time he’s let the 6th goal, including four which have gone unanswered he’s not sure who he wants to shout at more - himself or the D. Sometimes you can feel very alone and exposed out there on the ice and it feels even worse when he doesn’t have his own team around him. 

Ovechkin comes skating towards him, face worried. “Flower, you can do better than this!”

Flower glares at him. The last thing he needs are pep talks from Ovechkin.

“Don’t let them get to you,” Ovie nods around the arena where the crowd are getting increasingly restive about his performance; it doesn’t help that the Penguins put CBJ out of the playoffs the previous year. “You’re my second favourite goalie, of course you can do this!”

“I can’t do it unless you guys score goals! I need the puck in the net at the other end too!” he says somewhat bitterly. Ovie grins at him. 

“Of course we do that, that’s our job! And if we do that, you have to keep the puck out the net at this end.” He skates off again. 

Flower isn’t sure what it says about their weird, and getting weirder relationship that Ovechkin does exactly that on his next shift, setting up Nick and Joey for a simple pass around a sprawling Crow. As Ovie skates away from the brief cellie, he points up the ice towards Flower, points towards Crow’s goal and then back at Flower again. 

It’s probably even worse that it also seems to help Flower. For the last ten minutes of his period, his D come together a bit more, and he’s actually able to keep almost all of the pucks out of his net. Eventually, with a minute to go, Tavares sneaks one past him, but it’s a lot better than the first part of the period. Still, when the buzzer goes for the end of the period, he breathes out a long slow breath, feeling his body relaxing and shedding off tension as he skates to the bench. 

Carey and Elliott are waiting to commiserate with him as they walk back to the locker room. 

“Tough period,” Carey says softly. Flower nods. 

“That 91 line is lethal.” Flower looks to Elliott. “And don’t expect much from the D, they’re trying but it’s not working.” Price nods. 

“Yeah, we’re being left to hang a lot out there. Those stretch passes and breakaways were killing you,” he says. Flower shrugs. 

“I was killing me also. I was crap out there.” Carey looks at him appraisingly, eyebrow raised.  
“Yeah I know, it’s just the All Star game. It doesn’t count for anything. Still doesn’t mean I enjoyed being that crap in front of the entire league.” 

Elliott looks at him. “You know it’s not all on you?” he says. Flower shrugs. It feels like it is, no matter how much he tries to rationalise. 

“What did Ovie say to you?” Price asks curiously. Of course he had noticed. Flower growls.

“Like I needed an Ovie pep talk!” It’s a lie, and he knows it, but he feels exposed enough without admitting to that too. “He said I could do better, I told him they needed to score goals too. So he went out and did it - well an assist anyway - so I went out and did it.” Carey glances at him and leaves it at that. 

Inside the locker room is confusion and noise as guys get organised, get rehydrated, and settle down to hear what the coaches have to say. Flower tunes out - he’s not going to be going back out there as even if Elliott is injured, Price would go out again, given their respective performances. He does take the time to check on the sheep though which is staring balefully over the equipment bags, butting at them from time to time. 

“Hey, stop that, not long now until you get back to your nice safe farm,” he leans over and pets it on the head. It glares at him. Burns, walking into the showers, also apparently to do the same thing, stares at him. 

“Hey Flower, how do you know it comes from a farm?” he says, grinning like he’s caught Flower out. 

“Where else do sheep come from? They’re not usually kept in locker rooms!” Flower looks back at him, refusing to acknowledge. There’s a difference between having people know, and actually admitting it. “I may not be a country boy, but I do know that.”

“It is cute though!” Burns says. Flower begs to differ, but then Burns didn’t have the pleasure of herding it through the Nationwide for what felt like hours, trying to get it to the locker room in the first place. Flower tends to think of it as spawn of the devil - actually much like Ovie himself. Maybe there is more than just a name connecting them. 

There’s an uplift of noise from the rest of the room, suggesting guys are hyping up to go back out there. Flower heads to his stall and picks up his stuff - he has to take it out for the look of the thing, but he’s happy to leave most of it off and just carry it. Well, on with the show. 

0--0--0

Elliott is not doing much better than Flower did. Flower knows it’s a nasty thought, but at least he isn’t being shown up too badly. All things are relative. Team Toews are running away with it, and he can feel Foligno’s desperation as the clock ticks down. What was a three goal difference becomes a four goal difference and then a five goal difference, and they just aren’t scoring enough to match the goals from the other end. Voracek is having a ridiculous game and the 91 line is still going ballistic, tearing up the ice. Whoever put those three on a line together was a sadist. 

He sighs reflexively, tilts his water bottle and is hit with a deluge of water in the face. 

Fucking again. 

He feels the water running down his neck, trickling down his forehead. He brings his arm across his face, wiping it off… but he’s hesitating. His gut says Ovie again, but his head knows Carey Price is sitting next to him. Carey Price who no-one recognises as a trickster but who helped them smuggle a sheep into the building with no effort and then lied with the most innocent and believable face in the world.

He glances at Price who is laughing, but catches the look and returns it around his laughter. Ovie is practically doubled up over the bench in hysterics, face red and sweaty. And Flower knows. If Ovie saw it, then he was watching and he knew there was a reason to be watching. 

He takes a breath. “I’m not a fucking sheep Ovie, who needs to be watered regularly!” he exclaims down the bench. There’s more laughter at that one, spiced by the knowledge of what exactly is waiting impatiently in the showers and Ovie creases up even more. 

“Good guess,” mutters Carey beside him, still laughing. 

In the laughter, Team Toews scores again. Ah fuck it, it’s only the All Star game. 

0--0--0

Flower doesn’t escape the post-game media scrum. In fact the place is swarmed afterwards, so he does his hockey-player duty. Carey had - of course - checked on the sheep before starting his interviews, and it was lying down snoring in the corner of the shower. 

Flower’s asked about his crap game, but it’s hard to take it too seriously. He keeps it professional, doesn’t laugh too much, and reminds the interviewer it’s meant to be a fun weekend. Fortunately, it is being treated as that; most people just don’t know exactly what kind of fun. 

It seems to take forever for the media to clear out. Flower is delaying his own changing, as is Price, but so it seems is half the locker room. There’s a silent battle of wills going on, as everyone is waiting to see (or confirm) who is responsible for the sheep. Even Ovie is still there. The battles grinds to a halt when there’s a banging on the door and Seguin bounces in. 

“Flower, Pricey are we ready to…. “ he grinds to a halt, taking in the number of hockey players still in the room. There’s a sudden bubble of noise and exclamations around the room at his entrance. “Fuck what are you all still doing here? Our guys left twenty minutes ago.”

It’s not really a question you can ask without the obvious response. 

“It’s our locker room, what the fuck are you doing in it?” Burns growls at him. The mood towards any members of the 91 line is not exactly positive in this locker room.

Flower thinks that now would really be a great time to bail, to say they’d arranged to head out for drinks post-game…It would be a perfect out. But that would leave the sheep stuck in the shower room and no matter how annoying it is, they just can’t do that. Seguin is floundering now under the gazes, just giggling at them all, leaning against the door, face flaming. He’s not looking at Flower at all. Flower has to give him props for thinking on his feet about that. 

“Oh fuck it,” Flower says getting to his feet. “Of course Segy came to help me with the sheep! You guys are just too fucking nosy you know. You could have been drinking half an hour ago!” He could out Carey, but he’s not doing that without a sign from Price; he was dragged into it afterall. 

Giroux looks across at him. “Well that’s you explained and Seguin explained… but why was he looking for Pricey?” Flower shrugs at him, glances at Carey. 

Carey looks at Giroux blankly, face puzzled. The hairs on the back of Flower’s neck stand on end as he recognises that perfectly judged expression. It’s the same kind of look someone has when they pick up a hand of cards and says ‘now, how do we play this game?’ 

“But why wouldn’t he have been looking for me Claude? I was in on it too.” Carey grins suddenly, enjoying the even greater buzz of noise and cursing around him. Johanson looks at him. 

“But you persuaded Nick to leave the sheep here!” he says. Price cocks an eyebrow at him. 

“Yeah, we weren’t going to all that effort to not have the sheep in the room when Ovie came in. What would be the point?” 

Ovechkin stands up, drawing all eyes to him. He starts applauding. 

“Well done guys! Not just for the sheep thing, but no-one realising that Pricey was involved in it. At all.” He waves at the three of them expansively. “But what do you expect? Flower is part Russian afterall! It has to come out, however imperfectly. Now, can you please take the sheep back so we can go catch up with Luongo?”

In the end, there is a procession of hockey players taking the sheep back, making sure no-one sees it (except hockey players - Flower is not sure why they think that’s being discrete when hockey players are such gossips), guiding the sheep using sticks with a lot less pain than Tyler and Flower had had by themselves. As a result, it goes surprisingly quickly - Joey even knows a shortcut to the loading bay. Flower looks at him curiously. 

“Won’t you have to tell Foligno?”

“Sure. In fact that’s the deal. He gets to officially ignore it so long as I give him the full update afterwards!”. 

Hockey players. Gossips. 

Sheep man is somewhat overwhelmed to find his sheep in the company of pretty much half of the All Star players. Ovechkin looks like he is going to cry when the sheep is loaded back into the trailer. Flower is happy that it’s all done now, no matter how successful the results, and he can get some serious drinking in. He catches Seguin and Price’s eyes as the Sheep man drives away. 

“Alcohol?”

“Oh fuck yeah!” says Seguin happily. 

“Thought you’d never ask!” says a voice from the shadows of the loading bay. Luongo emerges, blinking at them in the brighter light. “So whose idea was the sheep?”

Flower really starts to feel some sympathy about what his team mates say about goalies. It certainly doesn’t apply to him - but some goalies need to tone down their creepy know-all tendencies. 

0--0--0

Flower’s very hungover when he goes to check-out, but hey, Luongo was correct, the All-Star Weekend does go better with a shit load of alcohol. And he, Price, Seguin and Luongo had found a bottle of very, very, very good Cognac last night that it would have been criminal to have left undrunk and unloved in Columbus. He’s pretty sure no-one else would have appreciated it. He’s not even sure Carey appreciated it and he knows Seguin had no idea what they were drinking, but he’d helped drink it anyway, in a moment of pure sheep-wrangling bonding. After that bottle there may have been lesser bottles, and they might have finished off Luongo’s personal stash… the evening got increasingly hazy as time passed. 

He’s almost certain when he sees his bill that the hangover is making him see double, as there appears to be way too many numbers in the total. He blinks rapidly, trying to clear his vision, but nothing changes. 

“Excuse me, there seems to be an error with my bill, it’s for four thousand dollars. I’ve only stayed three nights and the room was paid centrally!” There’s a certain edge to his tone. 

“Oh, let me look into that for you sir!” There’s a pause while the receptionist taps away on her computer. “No, that’s correct. Most of the charge is due to the flowers you asked to be delivered?”

His hand clenches on the bill on the desk. Fucking Ovie filled his room with flowers, and signed them to HIS room?! Had been smirking at him all weekend, knowing Flower would be facing this on check-out? Flower can just imagine him chortling away to himself with the knowledge. 

“Can you tell me if Mr Ovechkin has checked out yet?” 

She looks a bit confused, but there’s a pause while she taps again at the keyboard. 

“No, he’s still checked in.”

The anger simmers down and he smiles at her. 

“Ok, that’s excellent, can I leave a note to be given to him at check-out? And yeah, sorry, I forgot about the flowers. They were gorgeous by the way.”

She smiles back at him. 

“Certainly Mr Fleury - and yes, I saw the picture of them on Twitter.” 

She hands him some hotel headed notepaper and he quickly scribbles “Thanks so much for the Cognac Alex!” with a little picture of a flower underneath it and a couple of kisses for good measure, puts it in an envelope and hands it back to her alongside his credit card. 

Having finished checking out, he wonders if he should hang around to see Ovie’s reaction, but decides he’s better getting out of the firing line. 

By the time he’s walking towards a taxi, he’s wearing a massive grin. Afterall, while he was complaining about having to pay four thousand dollars for flowers which were in his room, and made him look good, Ovie will have to pay seven thousand dollars for a bottle of very good Cognac which he didn’t even get to taste, let alone realise it was consumed at his expense. The hotel really needs to improve the security checks it uses when signing bar bills to a room…. Carey hadn’t even spelled Ovechkin correctly on the bar tab. 

While Ovie might have had the entire weekend to enjoy his smirking, well Flower’s getting the final say. 

He pulls out his phone to check Twitter and his jaw drops. Carey has tweeted the Team Foligno selfie with the sheep, with no further comment or explanation. Twitter has exploded as a result; #AllStarSheep has gone viral as a hashtag. Flower chortles to himself, scrolling down the reaction as fans and journalists speculate about what it all means. Deadspin has it. Puck Daddy has it. NBC has it. Even ESPN has it and they don’t care about hockey. This has totally eclipsed Vancouver. And no sheep were harmed either, in the making of it all. It’s even quite a decent picture of him. 

His feeling of well-being is only compounded when, on the taxi ride to the airport, his phone buzzes with yet another text. This one is not from friends asking about the sheep. It’s not even from Pens PR demanding explanations of him. 

**YOU RUSSIAN FRENCH-CANADIAN FUCKER!!!! THIS DOES NOT END HERE**

And that, that was really what he needed - acknowledgement from Ovie that he’s won this one. He grins broadly all the way to the airport, and all the way back home to Pittsburgh. Sometimes, life is great. He can’t wait until they next play the Capitals…. 

Bring it on.

**Author's Note:**

> This started off as a little gem of an idea, which then grew and grew and grew. I should have known with Flower and Ovie and then Seguin (who crept in and then kept insisting on more) and also an appearance by Carey Price (who also insisted on a much larger part than originally scripted) that this was not going to be short. It's had a long gestation too - I started writing it back in the off-season, when we were all still ok about writing K/T - luckily, minimal airbrushing had to be done. And then we realised the next All Star Game isn't far away, so had to post it before that.


End file.
